A Taiwanese Company Tests French-Made Self-Driving Bus

choi

Chris Horton, 无人驾驶巴士将台湾载向智能交通的未来？ 纽约时报, Sept 28, 2017
https://cn.nytimes.com/china/20170929/taiwan-autonomous-bus-test/

, which is translated from

Chris Horton, In Taiwan, a Small Driverless Bus May Hint at Big Things to Come; Using GPS and eight laser sensors to cover preset routes. New York Times, Sept 28, 2017, at page B4 (about 3/4 of a page, including a big photo).

My comment:
(a)
(i) cn.nytimes.com has "The electric vehicle crawls along no faster than 6 m.p.h. * * * said Amber Chen, who was riding with her 8-year-old son Ruey-Shen [which is translated as 瑞申]."
(ii) the www.nytimes.com is the same as the print: "The electric vehicle crawled along at a speed of no more than six miles per hour. And only 12 passengers could fit inside [6 seats and six passengers standing]. * * * said Amber Chen, who was riding with her son Ruey-She, 8."

Quotations from here on are all from print (ie, www.nytimes.com).
(b) "the bus being tested, the EZ10 [no Chinese name], has breezed through its trials on the campus of National Taiwan University, which have been in progress since May. {The testing has the support of Taipei mayor] Ko Wen-Je 柯文哲, said] Wei-Bin Lee, commissioner of Taipei’s Department of Information Technology 市政府资讯局局长李维斌 [中正大學資訊工程研究所博士]. * * * Martin Ting, the general manager 总经理丁彦允 of 7StarLake [Co, Ltd 喜门史塔雷克股份有限公司, based in 新北市新店区], the Taiwanese company testing the buses * * * The EZ10 is built by the French company EasyMile [founded in 2014; headquartered in Toulouse; no Chinese name]. It uses GPS and eight laser sensors to navigate predetermined routes. Front and rear cameras enable it to detect and avoid obstacles. At $550,000 a unit, including import taxes, it is nearly twice the price of a larger bus with a driver.  Mr Ting said he hoped to import three more buses next year and begin manufacturing them under a license from EasyMile by the end of 2018, with the goal of getting half of the components from Taiwanese suppliers. That would eliminate the 45 percent import tax, saving approximately $200,000 per bus. * * * The EZ10, with a top speed of 25 mph, achieves 'Level 4' automation under the standards of the global engineering association SAE International, meaning its route is chosen by humans but there is no one behind the wheel and it can avoid obstacles on its own. Tesla's Autopilot system is considered Level 2, although Elon Musk, the company's chief executive, said this year that Tesla was only two years away from Level 5: complete autonomy."

Toulouse
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toulouse
(City name "is of unknown meaning or origin")
(c) "Jason Hsu, a legislator" 立法委员许毓仁
(d) It is odd. 7StarLake's Martin Ting talks as if he owns the technology, but in fact the French company owns it (technology).